1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a test material storage and feed device with a light-proof container for receiving photographic material as the test material. The container has a delivery mouth for delivering the photographic material in the form of test sections from the container. Further, the invention relates to a photographic printer, which is equipped with a test material storage and feed device.
2. Description of Related Art
In connection with further processing of photographic film, it is required, on one hand, to develop the negative or positive film and, on the other hand, to transfer the film onto photographic paper, when required, in order to produce paper prints of the positive, or negative film. In the course of film processing, various types of chemicals are employed in development sections of appropriate photographic film processing installations. In this case, it is necessary to test whether the properties of developing chemical baths, through which the photographic material is conducted, lie within the tolerance interval, or whether the developer solutions need to be replaced or treated so that they again have sufficient developing power.
When checking the developer solutions, chemical film test strips are employed in a film processor, and are conducted through the developing area of a film processor. In this case, the chemical film test strips have a predefined exposure. Following development, the density of the chemical film test strip is measured in a transmission densitometer in order to draw conclusions regarding the state of the developer solutions, rinsing baths, etc., on the basis of the measurement results. Until now, it was necessary for the operators to cut off a defined piece of film from a test film roll in a darkroom and to insert it into a film cartridge, which could be connected to the film processor. Subsequently, the cartridge was inserted into a film loading cassette. A leader card was set in front of the test film section, glued to the test film section and subsequently inserted, by the film loading cassette, into the film processor. The leader card was conducted through its development area and taken out again at its end in order to be able to perform the above-mentioned transmission density measurement. By means of notch markings of the test film on the film roll the operators can determine where the required test film strip must be cut off the test film roll.
Corresponding problems also exist in the development areas of paper processors. In order to be able to check or measure the chemical status of photographic paper processors, the producers of copying paper make available so-called test strips in the form of individual sheets. These test strips have already been pre-exposed with a pre-defined test pattern. For a chemical test, a test strip is transported through the paper processor or the entire minilab, where, in the latter case, no exposure takes place in the printer. Thereafter, the developed test strip is measured with a colorimeter to obtain information regarding the state of the treatment baths in the paper processor.
One such test strip is customarily inserted into a cassette which is specially designed for this test, and the cassette is connected to the normal paper outlet of the printer, or minilab. As a result of a manual control command, the test strip is taken out of the cassette by a motor and placed into the normal paper path of the minilab and fed to the paper processor.
Thus, in accordance with the above process, for every chemical test it is necessary to remove the paper cassette containing the copying paper supply and to put the test strip cassette in its place, and to replace the test strip cassette with the copying paper supply when the test is finished. Performing a chemical test in this way is relatively cumbersome and inconvenient.